The conservative Popular Party MP, Guillermo Collarte, who serves in the national parliament, the regional parliament of northeastern Galicia, and as a town councillor, poured out his tale of financial woe to local newspaper Voz de Galicia.

"Between the €416 they give me as a councillor, which does not cover anything, the €4,200 roughly, I earn as a deputy and the 290 I earn for time served in the assembly, I get about 5,100 euros in all, and I have a pretty tough time of it," he complained.

In a country with one in four workers jobless, many of them receiving just 400 euros a month after their regular unemployment benefits expire, the reaction was not entirely sympathetic.

"Poor guy, I feel his pain," said one user's comment on Twitter, part of a flood of indignant messages tagged £verguenza (shame).

"If you have a tough time of it, imagine how it is for others," said one commentator.